A Nightmare On Elm Street

dreamskills

(EDITED 23/09/22)

"Donald, she said she grabbed it off his head in her dream." I walk down the last few steps, hearing my mother on the phone.

"No I'm not crazy. I'm holding the damn thing right here in my hand." I edge closer towards the kitchen.

"I don't know where she really found it. I gotta go." She hangs up, screening something with the her body.

I enter the room, with an extraordinary look. My hair is ashen, skin transluscent, and eyes dark-ringed. My right forearm is heavily bandaged over the slashes.

I make my way over to side and pick up the cup of coffee. "You didn't sleep at all last night, did you?" I hear my mother say from behind me.

I didn't say anything and instead I drank more from the cup. "The doctor says you have to sleep or-"

"I'll go even crazier?" I spit as I finished the cup of coffee.

"I don't think you're crazy, and stop drinking that damn coffee."

I simply ignore her, walking over to the fridge. "So, did you ask daddy to have the hat examined?"

She turns to me. "I threw that filthy thing away. I don't know where you found it or what you're trying to prove-"

I slam my hand on the fridge. "What I learned in the dream clinic is what I'm trying to prove, mother. Tod didn't kill Libby and he didn't hang himself. It's this guy. He's after us in our dreams."

"That's just not reality, Nicole." My mother sighs, facing away from me.

I thrust open the drawer and retrieve the hat. "It's real mama. Feel it."

"Give me that damn thing." She spins round, attempting to grab the hat but I step away.

"It even has his name written in it. Fred Krueger, mom. Fred Krueger." I say, holding the hat up to my face and showing her where the name was written. "Do you know who that is mother? Because if you do, you better tell me because he's after me now."

"Nicole, trust your mother for once, please. You'll feel better once you get some sleep."

"Feel better?" I ask, giving out a humourless laugh, whilst holding up my slashed arm. "You call this feeling better? Or maybe, I should grab that bottle and veg out with you. Avoid everything happening to me by just getting good and loaded."

I felt a burn right across my cheek. The room falls silent, both of us just staring at each other.

"Fred Krueger can't come after you Nicole. He's dead. Believe me, I know."

I slowly walk towards my mother. "You knew about him all this time and you've been acting like it was something I made up?"

"Nicole, you're sick. There's something wrong with you. You're imagining things. You'll feel better when you sleep. It's just as simple as that."

I grab the bottle of Gin. "Screw sleep!" I yell, before throwing it on the floor, smashing into pieces. I then walk off to the front door.

"Nicole, it's just a nightmare."

I take my jacket before wheeling around to face my mother. "That's enough." I leave the house, slamming the door behind me.

______

Glen and I are walking across this strange white bridge in old Los Angeles when he speaks up.

"Whenever I get nervous, I eat." I hear him say.

"And if you can't do that, you sleep."

"I used to. Not anymore."

We pause somewhere along the bridge so Glen could eat his food. My hair is startlingly white in the sunlight as I'm reading a book, hardly paying attention to Glen as he talks.

"Did you ever read about the Balinese way of dreaming?"

"No."

"They got this whole system they call 'dream skills'. So, if you have a nightmare, for instance like falling, right?"

"Right."

"Well instead of screaming and getting nuts, you say, 'okay, I'm gonna make up my mind that I fall into a magic world.' Make it somewhere special, like a poem or song. They get all their art and literature from dreams. Just wake up and write it down. Dreamskills."

He stops, seeing the look on my face.

"And what if they meet a monster in their dream? Then what?" I ask.

"They turn their back on it. Take away its energy, and it disappears."

"But what happens if they don't do that?"

He shrugs. "Well, I guess those people don't wake up to tell what happens."

"Great." I sigh, leaning over the railing, playing around with my book.

Glen tips its cover and reads the title. "Booby Traps and Improvised Anti-personel Devices? Well, what are you reading that for?"

I grin, determined. "I'm into survival."

"See you." I say walking away, leaving Glen watching after me in astonishment. "You're starting to scare me."